welcome

Dear All,
A belated welcome to 2026, and to another round of black shabbat, a recurring playlist of great black music, ancient to the future, in it’s fractalling variations.
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Here is a new song list: black shabbat now

After long dithering, I am switching from Spotify to Qobuz. It may well be there are not-so-good things about Qobuz’s corporate practices, but they pay artists more per stream than just about any other platform, and the sound quality is a gazillion times better than Spotify. The interface is clunky but utterly manageable. If you want to read a kind of deep dive into the why and how of switching, here is a good one:

SWITCH

The February version, #238 in the collection, includes the following players: Therese Malengreau, Anouar Brahem, Vijay Iyer and Wadada Leo Smith, Aruan Ortiz, Craig Taborn, Amina Claudine Myers, Yazz Ahmed, Ambrose Akinmusire, Jakob Bro, and Zsofia Boros. Click the playlist image above, then click “Try for Free” in upper right of window. Yes, you have to do a test drive which involves setting up an account. If you don't like it, or can’t face transferring your library to a new platform, cancel. For this round I am including a link HERE to the list in Spotify, but this won’t be the case going forward since I will stop maintaining a Spotify account.

My hope is that your family, chosen or otherwise, receives the playlist link with such great excitement that someone says, “Everyone, here’s the latest black shabbat hour of power, let’s gather our ears around the digital victrola and commune with the spirits and hear the future.”

other news

Here is a poem I am writing for dear friend Christine Moore, who passed away in January. She was a force in LA food, the Altadena community, and in many, many lives. I read this version at a gathering of friends and family, did not have to submit through submittable, and the feedback from Christine’s Mom was all I want for poetry accolades. ps, If you are reading this on a phone, the line breaks will be wrong.

Ploy

It’s the absolute pits here
since you left. Come back. I’m in
the kitchen, a ripping hot pan
popping open clams in wine, trinity
of garlic, shallot, chile, plus a smudge
of holy anchovy, thyme, a godless
knob of butter, deep in the weeds
expecting you. What’s your eta?
Grill a baguette. Find napkins
for bibs. Or forget dinner, it’s only
a summoning ploy. Truth, we’re a mess,
me, everyone, we need your gingersnap
antidote to cuts and burns, an embrace
that folds us into love’s vastness forever
for a sec. So sneak away when death
takes a nap. That dolt won’t notice.
Just step on it. What’s the hold-up?
Cold clams are blech, but I’m not above
bribing you back with a pack of lies or hope:
In the mere moments you’ve been gone,
the regime, we toppled it. We pulled down
its pants and statues. All the fashy dickheads
are daisy-pushing. It’s raining caramels.
Anyone who was true and good but
died before this future gets a do-over,
erases the mark of death—poof!
Hurry it up. In the long fight for the fabulous
world, we’re stronger for spoonfuls
of your pinstripe drip, dopamine jolts
from a blessed vision in radiant gold
sneakers. Jesus, Mary, Joseph and Glinda,
Christine, click your heels.